When West Coast gloss meets East Coast irony

As the second series of The OC begins on Channel 4, Benji Wilson looks at the enormous success and unusual appeal of this clever and deceptively sophisticated show which has even spawned its own language

When travel agents want to sell you California, it's the opening credits of The OC they hope you'll imagine. In the Orange County, where the hit TV series is set, the sea caresses the sand, the sunsets are always a deep orange, and so are most of the multi-millionaire residents. The show populates this Shangri-La with a cast of cover-girls and buffed boys, driving gleaming sports utility vehicles and sleeping together. Their schools resemble theme parks and extensive orthodontistry appears to be just part of growing up.

In other words, at first glance The OC looks exactly like the kind of escapist teen fantasy that sustained Melrose Place or Beverly Hills 90210 through several hundred episodes, and indeed, in abstract, it's hard to see why it should be treated any differently from previous rich-kid dramas. The indie-band intro of "Cal-a-fawn-yahh, here we cahhmm!" suggests another retelling of the West Coast fairytale that's been a topos of American broadcasting since the advent of colour TV.

In fact, The OC is cleverer than that. The reason it has been such an astounding success on both sides of the Atlantic is that it takes the West Coast idyll and injects it with a dose of East Coast irony.

Most of this emanates from the series' central family, the Cohens of Newport Beach. Kirsten Cohen (Kelly Rowan) may be a real-estate heiress with a red-carpet wardrobe, but, unlike most of her neighbours, she is a loving mother, selfless and grounded. Kirsten is married to Sandy (Peter Gallagher), a likeable Jewish lawyer from The Bronx with a conscience almost as big as his Neanderthal eyebrows. Sandy is a big fan of Newport's surf; less so of its preening denizens.

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"Sandy is the kind of dad I'd like to be one day," says the series' creator, Josh Schwartz.

Schwartz may, if he's lucky, grow up to be like Sandy, but right now at 28 he is much more like Sandy's son Seth, The OC's resident wit. Seth's monotone patter, a torrent of buzzwords and one-liners, is funny in itself but also offers an ironic gloss on what's going on around him. It's Seth's sardonic musings and deft barbs that make all the biceps, bikinis and neck-wrenching plot-twists palatable. He's like having an acerbic critic of the show, on the show.

The very existence of Seth represents Schwartz – also an anxious Barmitzvah boy with a mop of black hair and an array of tight polo shirts – getting his own back on the jocks he met in his time studying film at the University of Southern California.

"You do in your art what you cannot do in your life," he says, which may be why in The OC the geek gets all the girls. Fuelled by Seth's ironic take on all he sees around him, The OC is able to have its cake and eat it – superficial Californian consumption gets a good ribbing, while at the same time viewers get to enjoy the visual delights of superficial Californian consumption.

If Seth is the show's brain and Sandy its heart, then Ryan is its backbone. Ryan (Benjamin McKenzie) is a ne'er do well who promptly started to do well when he was taken under the Cohen family's gilded wing by a benevolent Sandy. Initially rejected by the local jocks on account of his unfamiliarity with water polo and a proclivity for stealing their girlfriends, he let his fists do the smooth-talking while becoming best of friends with that other archetypal outsider, Seth.

When The OC needs a new plotline, it invariably turns to Ryan, who brings with him miscreant friends from his former existence, and the kind of brooding stare that can snare a prom queen in seconds. New romance and new characters can come in handy when a dialogue-driven drama winds up in a storyline cul-de-sac.

The OC began life on UK screens in a cosy early slot on a Sunday evening, aimed at an aspirational teen audience who were supposed to like the clothes, the faces and the indie soundtrack. It soon became apparent, however, that the show also appealed to a much older audience, and new episodes are now shown first on Channel 4's edgier satellite sibling E4, in a 9pm midweek berth.

The key reason for the show's broader appeal is perhaps that beyond the cliffhangers and the quips there is a portrayal of interfamilial relations that is singularly modern. Seth shares everything with his parents in regular exchanges that are wryly humorous yet warmly sincere. Kirsten and Sandy's relationship, set in sharp relief by the marital fireworks all around them, is tender and believable.

This has all translated into healthy ratings – a programme watched and liked by an audience stretched across two, sometimes three generations. If kids are going to behave like Marissa (drink problem), Ryan (ultra-aggressive tendencies) or Seth's current squeeze Summer (sex addict and snob) then their parents will at least want them to talk about it like the Cohens do.

A further adult edge is added by The OC's playful irreverence. After Janet Jackson's Superbowl peepshow, the prevailing wind in American TV is very much against network shows taking risks, and The OC is never going to be anything more than stealth satire (especially as President Bush's daughters are both fans). But it still manages to be a little naughty. When Sandy asks one of Seth's many girlfriends why she is not with her parents on Thanksgiving Day, he says, "What's the deal? Your parents don't believe in celebrating the genocide of the American Indians?"

Several other sacred cows get similar treatment, and Jewishness is a constant source of humour. The show is even big enough to poke fun at itself – Marissa and Summer are both glued to a fictional weekly soap called The Valley, which is an obvious cipher for another teen drama set in a well-known Californian locale.

The presence of a spoof OC within The OC is a cute reminder that although this is an intelligent teen drama, it's still a teen drama. The second series will see Marissa plunge into a drunken abyss in outrage at her vampish mother's manipulations, Ryan finds a new squeeze, and Sandy and Kirsten facing financial ruin.

Viewers who find pot-boilers, plaintive indie rock and, like, American teen-chat intrinsically repellent should not think that here lies their passport out of BBC4. But, after the success of Dawson's Creek, and now riding high with The OC, Channel 4 seems to be convinced that savvy, soapy teen drama is the way to bridge the generation gap.

Point Pleasant, a sort of Buffy the Vampire Slayer meets Dawson's Creek, has just begun on E4 in a post-watershed slot and Smallville, the travails of an adolescent Clark Kent, has also been re-scheduled to ensnare the thirtysomethings. It would appear that the televisual equivalent of the bimbo with brains is coming to seduce us all.

Series two of 'The OC' begins tomorrow on Channel 4 at 2.05pm. Series one is out now on DVD.